Many factors can be attributed to such ‘blogger’s block’. At this moment, I’ve got 2 part-time teaching loads (that’s somewhat equivalent to a full-time load) and a software developer job while being a part-time educational technology graduate student having a study load of 9 units. Some would say that such case is already overload, right? Well, I’m still alive and kicking though after all of the electricity problems last year and the network connection issues this year.

From a quote of William Faulkner:

Don’t bother just to be better than your contemporaries or predecessors. Try to be better than yourself.

…I would say that I am improving – that my blog is still active since last year despite some drops of page ranks. I am looking forward to better posts this year though. By June, most likely I’ll be taking my research (EDRE) subjects as preparation for thesis. Currently, I’m doing a research about educational computer-based games as a requirement for an Educational Foundations course.

How about you? Do you have a bloggable quote that you can share?

Create your own video slideshow at animoto.com.

Merry Christmas educators!

Fortunately, the UP Diliman Interactive Learning Center (DILC) was able to accommodate my EDUC class last semester. My other classes from SLIS though had problems for we were supposed to have our laboratory exercises towards the end of the 1st semester and that really made a big impact in the output of their projects.

This 2nd semester, my EDUC class was again accommodated by the UP DILC. However, I’m still looking for Linux computer laboratories where I can hold my 2 LIS classes, and at the same time, I’m looking for a lab as well where my EDUC class can also use Linux for our skills development exercises. I hold my EDUC and LIS classes in the morning so if you have a spare Linux lab that you can lend to us with that schedule, you can help save our students and give them access to technology and Internet by leaving a comment on this blog post.

Thanks in advance!

Here are some excerpts from the slides presented by Dr. Muega:

Moving From 10-year Into A 12-Year Basic Education Cycle

Basic issues to address:

1. Should we immediately add – because it’s an urgent matter – two more years to basic education cycle? If yes, what are the new things that students must learn before graduating from basic education?

2. What are the implications of adding two more years to the current cycle of 10 years? What are the positive and negative consequences of adding two more years to the current basic education cycle?

Positive implications and possible positive consequences should be widely acceptable and realistic, i.e., not just beautiful sounding promises that could not be CLEARLY shown to be achievable by the proponents. Positive implications and possible positive consequences should also outweigh the negative implications and possible negative consequences.

3. Are there options, aside from extending the current basic education cycle, that may turn out to be more BENEFICIAL TO all the graduates of public basic education schools?

Never look at the other nations as our models. Our educational system should be responsive to our own pressing needs in the country. It is not the duty of our government to turn out professionals whose education and training are at par with their counterparts in other nations. We train and educate to address our own needs, first and foremost.

*****

My proposed solution if we are seriously interested in turning out employable young adults:

* Expand TESDA so we could accommodate more high school graduates who are planning to pursue vocational career paths
* Give college students the option to finish first their professional education and pass the licensure exam, if any, in their first few years in college before they finish their general education. Those who could finish their professional education and satisfy licensure requirements, if any, may be allowed to practice their profession even if they have yet to finish their general education.

I just hope that they’ll upload the minutes of the discussion online and continue the discourse by crowd-sourcing the topic.

UPDATE: Here’s an e-copy of DepEd’s discussion paper on the enhanced K-12 Basic Education program.

Obviously, just like my post on EduBloggerCon and ISTE Conference, I also searched what the hashtag was all about and then the results landed me on the 2010 Reform Symposium worldwide e-conference. The event was about to end its first day of the online conference. Luckily, I was able to attend the closing keynote by Sue Waters.

So what is the 2010 Reform Symposium all about? This is the description I got from their website:

The Reform Symposium is a free online conference for educators, administrators, parents and students. This year the conference is focused on innovative practices in education and what role these practices can play in educational reform.

Links from the event are collated through Google Docs whereas the recordings of the presentations will be stored at the presenters’ pages.

See you there!

Last night, the hashtags #ebc10 and #iste10 were all over my Twitter public timeline and those were tweets that were posted by my edtech contacts from other countries. After doing a Google search, I discovered that the hashtags were about two events, the EduBloggerCon 2010 and the International Society for Technology in Education (ISTE) Conference 2010.

The first event, EduBloggerCon (based from the definition on its wikispace)

“is an all-day unconference gathering for those interested in social media / Web 2.0 in education”.

Wikipedia states that:

an unconference is a facilitated, participant-driven conference centered on a theme or purpose. The term “unconference” has been applied, or self-applied, to a wide range of gatherings that try to avoid one or more aspects of a conventional conference, such as high fees and sponsored presentations.

So far, the only unconference I’m familiar with here in the Philippines is the BarCamp Manila. Perhaps, it would be nice to start holding an EduBloggerCon event too in the university. However, the question is – are there edubloggers in UP Diliman?

The second event, ISTE Conference 2010, is a conference organized by the International Society for Technology in Education (ISTE). Quoting from its website:

ISTE is the trusted source for professional development, knowledge generation, advocacy and leadership for innovation. (ISTE) is the premier membership association for educators and education leaders engaged in improving teaching and learning by advancing the effective use of technology in PK-12 and teacher education.

This organization was already familiar to me because it coined some of the definitions or terminologies I have taught in my EDUC 190 class. I was wondering about their membership application though.

Afterwards, I tried to keep track on Twitter more by following the hashtags #ebc10 and #iste10. I just wish I would be able to attend these events live! For now, let’s just stick with the EduBloggerCon 2010 Wikispace and the ISTE 2010 Remote Access/VOD/Webcast site.

Enjoy and see you in the Twitterverse and Blogosphere!

I’m now officially enrolled in 2 EdTech graduate majors as stated from my new Form 5 that is automatically generated and filled out by the system. It feels so good that I’m now on my 2nd year of graduate studies! Hooray! I just hope that I’ll get to have the reduced fees privileges/benefits too like most instructors have in the university. But wait, there’s more…

I’ll be handling a Computers in Education course at the UP College of Education! Wish me good luck!

Indeed, there are so many apps that can be used in teaching! Can you imagine that most (if not all) of these educational tools can be easily replaced by just a tiny gadget?

Given that the classroom is WiFi enabled, teachers will now have a way to check or verify information right away with just a simple tap on an iPhone. It fosters curiosity not only for the students but also for the teachers while being provided with up-to-date resources.

Although my old Sony Ericsson P990i smartphone can take pictures through its macro shot, the iPhone’s camera still overpowers it. Through apps that can instantly upload photos right after taking it, students can now easily share photos (e.g. TwitPic) of laboratory experiment results on a class blog instead of using a paper and pencil that is prone to inaccuracy and the fact that it has low accessibility too.

Students can also create productions such as podcasts or even vodcasts (e.g. Qik, Ustream, etc.) – and this is what I would like to see in a preschool setting in the Philippines in which kindergarten students make a presentation using these media. Isn’t that wonderful, cute, and amazing at the same time?

Feedback is now interactive and a lot faster. The reactions or reflections of students can be easily gathered, published and even archived. For the teacher, assessment is fast and more accurate; say goodbye to manual computations on paper. Last 2nd semester, I found out that the Edu 2.0 portal had an iPhone version as well! Impressive!

Now, can you imagine yourself teaching with an iPhone in hand as well? Go paperless now and grab that powerful toolbox that fits in your pocket!

Wish me good luck!